balancing ambient and flash

[Rain Lily]

C&C appreciated, please tell me what I did wrong plus what I did right.

There has been a small amount of brightening of their faces, using a levels layer.

Thanks!

[Medowlark]

The people and their clothes look purple to me...

And, I'm sure you know the background is blown...

I don't know much about posing, but I think it might be more balanced if the the girl was with dad and the boy with mom...

Sorry, I can't make any suggestions about the lighting and white balance...

[camrajoky]

You need to meter the ambient light first...then try to set the fill flash to that level or just higher if you want to take the background darker.

[patterfr]

Looks like you used the flash for fill and didn't try overpowering the sun and using the flash as the main.
With all do respect to Al, the bg is bright, but I don't see it as blown on my monitor and I don't know that you can overpower the sun in a field like this with a small flash. SO that if you metered the ambient, you couldn't possibly set the flash high enough to make it brighter than the sunlit ambient with a small flash
I always thought that choosing a darker bg to begin with makes it easier.
Still, I like the shot. Happy expressions and I love the setting if it was darker.

[gaopa2]

I like the photo, Sis. Working with flash outside in light is difficult, but you handled it. Cheers, Bill P.

[swampler]

Looks like the top third of the image is nearly blown, and you have bright patches of light hitting Mom and Dad directly. The image also appears to have really low contrast.

I think that if the sun had been directly behind them (to prevent the splotches on Mom and Dad) and underexposed a stop with flash to light up the family would have worked better.

Hope that wasn't too harsh...

[Medowlark]

Originally Posted by patterfr

Looks like you used the flash for fill and didn't try overpowering the sun and using the flash as the main.
With all do respect to Al, the bg is bright, but I don't see it as blown on my monitor and I don't know that you can overpower the sun in a field like this with a small flash. SO that if you metered the ambient, you couldn't possibly set the flash high enough to make it brighter than the sunlit ambient with a small flash
I always thought that choosing a darker bg to begin with makes it easier.
Still, I like the shot. Happy expressions and I love the setting if it was darker.

Sorry, I guess you're right Fran... There are lots of spots where the green channel is at 255, but nothing totally blown... Now I'm wondering about my monitor... Does anyone else see the purple... eg. the girl's blue jeans are anything but blue on my monitor and it is far more noticeable when I open the image in PS than what I see here.

[oldugly]

Yep, I get the purple too. Of course my monitor hasn't been recalibrated in about six weeks. Oops, purple on my laptop too, and it was just done a week ago. Yep, looks as if the "Barney Virus" has struck again.....

[Rain Lily]

Originally Posted by Medowlark

The people and their clothes look purple to me...
And, I'm sure you know the background is blown...
I don't know much about posing, but I think it might be more balanced if the the girl was with dad and the boy with mom...
Sorry, I can't make any suggestions about the lighting and white balance...

Thanks, Al
I know Fran addressed it below but the background is bright on both my camera and my monitor, but not blown. I checked the histogram at the site and it seemed to be ok, and I did meter the ambient right there...of course I'm on a laptop and it may not be correct either LOL.

As far as the purple, everything looks blue to me. Mom's jeans may have more of a tendency toward purple than anyone else, but still, I'm seeing blue. Again with the laptop.

Tomorrow I'm hooking up a new monitor - I meant to this week, and just didn't have time - but I'll get it running and calibrate it and see what happens. Thanks so much for commenting!

Originally Posted by camrajoky

You need to meter the ambient light first...then try to set the fill flash to that level or just higher if you want to take the background darker.

I did meter the ambient first, and I did not want the background darker. I was trying to capture the light of the late afternoon sun on those grasses. Thanks for commenting, Thomas.

Originally Posted by patterfr

Looks like you used the flash for fill and didn't try overpowering the sun and using the flash as the main.
With all do respect to Al, the bg is bright, but I don't see it as blown on my monitor and I don't know that you can overpower the sun in a field like this with a small flash. SO that if you metered the ambient, you couldn't possibly set the flash high enough to make it brighter than the sunlit ambient with a small flash
I always thought that choosing a darker bg to begin with makes it easier.
Still, I like the shot. Happy expressions and I love the setting if it was darker.

I did do exactly that, Fran, not trying to overpower the sun. I was trying to capture just those colors of light on the grass. And yes, I agree with shooting using a darker background - I did some of that about 15 minutes later at my dad's farm, lol. What I did was meter the ambient, set my camera, and then set the flash at -2, if I'm remembering correctly. I expected to have to brighten the faces a little bit. The histogram looked pretty good, I thought. Of course, I see other mistakes but overall, it was a great learning experience. Thanks so much for commenting, Fran.

Originally Posted by gaopa2

I like the photo, Sis. Working with flash outside in light is difficult, but you handled it. Cheers, Bill P.

Bill, thank you for the encouragement!

Originally Posted by swampler

Looks like the top third of the image is nearly blown, and you have bright patches of light hitting Mom and Dad directly. The image also appears to have really low contrast.

I think that if the sun had been directly behind them (to prevent the splotches on Mom and Dad) and underexposed a stop with flash to light up the family would have worked better.

Hope that wasn't too harsh...

lol, no Steve, not to harsh at all. Thanks for giving some good input for me to learn from.
If you don't mind, please clarify what you mean about low contrast. If you're talking about on the faces, I agree, and would have loved to have had an assistant that day to help me with off-camera flash or a reflector or something. If you meant something other than that, please tell me, because it seems as if the rest of the photo has decent contrast to me. I'd like to hear more detailed critique on that, if you will.

Those patches of light, yeah, bummer. lol. I really wish I'd had someone there to hold a reflector for me, and would have tried it that way.

Thanks for commenting, Steve

Originally Posted by Medowlark

Sorry, I guess you're right Fran... There are lots of spots where the green channel is at 255, but nothing totally blown... Now I'm wondering about my monitor... Does anyone else see the purple... eg. the girl's blue jeans are anything but blue on my monitor and it is far more noticeable when I open the image in PS than what I see here.

Originally Posted by oldugly

Yep, I get the purple too. Of course my monitor hasn't been recalibrated in about six weeks. Oops, purple on my laptop too, and it was just done a week ago. Yep, looks as if the "Barney Virus" has struck again.....

LOL Frank!

I'm not seeing it, but that doesn't mean it ain't so! I'll investigate further on that, thanks Al and Frank for the heads up.


I appreciate everyone's time and thoughts, thank you!

[Jgolden]

very nice shot, i have been going through the same issues balancing ambient with flash, seems i had it backwards, i was stopping down the flash rather than opening it up, which opening it up really makes more sense, ive only been on this site for a couple of days and am really enjoying all the great advice and honest critiques that ive seen and been given, again very nice family portrait.

[swampler]

Originally Posted by Rain Lily

lol, no Steve, not to harsh at all. Thanks for giving some good input for me to learn from.
If you don't mind, please clarify what you mean about low contrast. If you're talking about on the faces, I agree, and would have loved to have had an assistant that day to help me with off-camera flash or a reflector or something. If you meant something other than that, please tell me, because it seems as if the rest of the photo has decent contrast to me. I'd like to hear more detailed critique on that, if you will.

Those patches of light, yeah, bummer. lol. I really wish I'd had someone there to hold a reflector for me, and would have tried it that way.

Thanks for commenting, Steve

Yes, the faces are what I was referring to.

[gsk]

Sis.
I'm on my laptop and the blues look purple to me also. The background does look very bright to me. When I just look at the photo, my eye goes to the bright background between the two kids before it sees the family. Nice looking family.

[KellyL]

First thing I would do in this situation is lower the exposure on the background by at least 2/3 of a stop. Next I would fill flash...but you would probably need to fill with +1 or more.

A very, very tricky situation. Jason Cole does these kinds of shots all the time but he takes out powerful studio lights to illuminate the subjects.

By underexposing the background a tad you will bring in some very rich colors.

Then by adding the flash you will bring your subject up to or beyond what you metered the background for, depending on how powerful your flash is.

[Rain Lily]

Originally Posted by Jgolden

very nice shot, i have been going through the same issues balancing ambient with flash, seems i had it backwards, i was stopping down the flash rather than opening it up, which opening it up really makes more sense, ive only been on this site for a couple of days and am really enjoying all the great advice and honest critiques that ive seen and been given, again very nice family portrait.

I agree with you, this is great learning for me! And thank you for commenting. I appreciate the nice words

Originally Posted by swampler

Yes, the faces are what I was referring to.

Thanks, Steve, point taken and appreciated. Thanks for coming back and clarifying.

Originally Posted by gsk

Sis.
I'm on my laptop and the blues look purple to me also. The background does look very bright to me. When I just look at the photo, my eye goes to the bright background between the two kids before it sees the family. Nice looking family.

Thank you for the input, and I'll work on that. I see what you mean about the bright background spot. Appreciate it!

Originally Posted by KellyL

First thing I would do in this situation is lower the exposure on the background by at least 2/3 of a stop. Next I would fill flash...but you would probably need to fill with +1 or more.

A very, very tricky situation. Jason Cole does these kinds of shots all the time but he takes out powerful studio lights to illuminate the subjects.

By underexposing the background a tad you will bring in some very rich colors.

Then by adding the flash you will bring your subject up to or beyond what you metered the background for, depending on how powerful your flash is.

Thanks, Kelly, great information! I'll try this again and do what you're saying and maybe even manage to get the softlighter out there.

[KellyL]

If you are just using regular flash and not high speed sync, you are limited to a shutter speed of 1/250 or 1/200 on a Canon (I think 1/500 on a Nikon, but I may be wrong).

So your shutter speed is going to dictate your aperture.

First, I would use the lowest ISO possible. With your camera, I believe it will be ISO 100.

Next, knowing that ISO 100 and f/16 and Shutter speed of 100 will give me a good exposure, I am going to think about increasing the shutter speed.

This gives me a shutter speed of 1/250.

Increasing the shutter speed allows me to change the aperture.

Since I have gained one stop of play with the aperture, I am going to use f/11.

So ISO 100, f/11, Tv at 250 will give me a fairly well exposed image, theoretically...on the background.

Now you have the couple facing with the sun coming in from Camera left. If the sun on the Wheat meters around f.11 so is the sun coming in on their faces.

I am just going to think out loud for a minute....

Shutter controls ambient light
Aperture controls flash (and affects shutter for ambient)

So If you do shoot this at ISO 100 f.16 Tv 100 and increase the Tv to say 175 you would be underexposing the background by a tad. You could then shoot your flash at f/16 for fill.

I would have to try it to understand it more completely.

The thing that has me bamboozled is the sidelight of sun hitting their faces.

Jason Cole usually also has his subjects sitting in the shade. But not always.

I have to have a flash that will output then, at f/11 or f/16 depending on how I chose to shoot this.

[patterfr]

Nikon is 1/250 max shutter sync as well.
Good 'splaining Kelly thanks.

WIth natural light we all like to play with narrow DOF.
With outside strobes, is there too much ambient to shoot at 4.0 or 2.8/ Is that what all the algebra is saying?

[Rain Lily]

It is great info and I'll be happy to see the answer to Fran's question too.

And just fyi, my 5D can get to 50 ISO, Kel. That might make a difference in your calculations.

[patterfr]

50 iso?
show off.

[Rain Lily]

Originally Posted by patterfr

50 iso?
show off.

LOL

I don't understand it, I have to go and make an adjustment that will allow it to go to 50 and to 3200. I can't remember what it's called.

[KellyL]

Originally Posted by patterfr

Nikon is 1/250 max shutter sync as well.
Good 'splaining Kelly thanks.

WIth natural light we all like to play with narrow DOF.
With outside strobes, is there too much ambient to shoot at 4.0 or 2.8/ Is that what all the algebra is saying?

Ah Sis...I didn't realize you had the 5D! Shame on me!

I was wondering exactly how you did this, because the shot to me looked more like a 5.6 than an 8.0...

So yes...since we all love to shoot and get that wonderful shallow DOF we are challenged to something new.

IF I have the luxury of ISO 50 that helps.

Let's take a look at our sunny 16 rule again.

f/16 ISO 100 TV 1/100.

ISO 50 allows me one stop to play with.

f/11, ISO 50, Tv 1/100.

I can't get anymore play out of my ISO to help with my aperture, so I have to go to my shutter to begin opening my aperture.

f/8, ISO 50, TV 1/200

f/5.6, ISO 50, TV 1/500

f/4.0, ISO 50, Tv 1/1000

You would need to have your camera on HIGH SPEED SYNC in order to use your flash and get the desired DOF.

TriCoast Photography uses 4.0, 3.5, and 2.8 all the time in their photography using HIGH SPEED SYNC. As long as your flash is on your camera, ETTL will come to your aid.

They also use off camera flash AND ETTL. Problem is, you have to have a mechanism to control the ETTL and High Speed Sync. Without the mechanism your are stuck with a Tv of 200 (on the 5D).

www.radiopopppers.com provide just the product.

I saw Mike and Cody when I was in Texas and the demonstrated how they use the Radio Poppers, Canon Flash, ETTL and High Speed Sync to get the thin DOF in bright sunlight on beaches etc.

On camera...use HIGH SPEED SYNC

Off camera...you are limited to a slower shutter speed unless you can afford the devices that allow for high speed sync .